Amateur Palemates Smuttin It Up!
by Asuka Kureru
Summary: Karkat/Gamzee moirallegiance. Karkat's Adventures in Altruistic Asexual Exhibitionism. Public cuddles, Mr. Vantas? Daring. ...Now with sequel! Kinky Transquadrant Affair. Le gasp.
1. Amateur Palemates Smuttin It Up!

_For a prompt on the kink meme that requested pale and ashen "porn", IE something more about an emotional high/release than a sexual one. "So, that explained, what I'd like to see is a fill during the three years, where the trolls don't have access to any of this wonderful cathartic porn (Alternia being destroyed) and just start...watching each other instead. Like, the established moirails and/or ashen trios would start being more public with each other while the rest discretely watch."_

_1) I hate writing Sol's lisp. 2) don't ask why some trolls are alive while Gamz and Karkat are already together. It's magic._

* * *

Of course he'd caught the little glances. Sneaky or not, they'd been going on for perigees now; he would have had to be blind, and also to be hit on the head with something heavy and not skull-friendly.

At first he hadn't cared because of _course_ it was Leader-envy, or admiration or secret crushes or what the fuck ever they had other shit to do and if someone wanted to speak up they could and in the meantime fuck you, and after that for a while he'd mostly gritted his teeth and tried to tell himself it was just paranoia and/or perfectly normal group dynamics in a long-term close quarters arrangement; it wasn't like he'd socialized much at all before the Game, and even then only one-on-one, so how would he know. Right? Right.

Only they'd never looked at him that way before he and Gamzee hooked up, and then he realized it wasn't _him _people looked at, it was at _them_.

Which was so fucking far past not okay it had done a whole revolution around okay and gone right back to cross into _fuck you, no_ territory again.

Sollux was blind, which ought to have meant he was physically unable to do that shit (and Karkat had somewhat subconsciously expected like a stupid moron that he wouldn't judge even if he could have) but Terezi'd been teaching him tongue-o-vision, and there he was with his head tilted their way and his lips parted to breathe in deep. So when, after a last shoulderpat, Gamzee ambled off to the transportalizer and left them on their own, Karkat was off like a bomb.

"What the fuck is your problem? Even you, Captor, even fucking you, thank you very much, you're my best fucking friend you judgey asshole! Reasons why Karkat Vantas sucks as a leader, friend, and _person_, case seventy-five billionth and three-"

And now the nookwipe was making a startled face and looking all woundedly innocent, hah. "KK, what the fuck are you going on about now-"

"Clause one, having already established that the defendant is an unreliable piece of shit who falls asleep on the job or otherwise drops the ball into varied manners of bottomless holes and snake-filled hell pits -"

"KK! You were fine a thecond ago, seriously what!"

"Clause two, having established that the defendant's moirail represents a grave threat to the community-"

"Theriously I will bitchslap the stupid out of you if you don't calm the hell down!"

"-am presenting a motion to declare the defendant fucking incompetent to be a fluffy hopbeast's fucking moirail, much less his, and thanks guys for your trust in my abilities, and thanks again for putting your nose in our private business and _what's your goddamned problem with me and Gamzee!_"

Sollux stared his way (sort of, but he'd never lost the habit of facing people he talked with the way Terezi had) with a look of dawning - what? Embarrassment? Horror? Karkat couldn't tell - and then scrunched his eyes closed like he was bracing himself for pain, or maybe like he'd found something really disgusting in his shoes and he was going to have to clean it up.

"Oh hell. KK. _No_. No, for fuck's thake, that's not - oh hell." Karkat took a deep breath, less to brace himself and more to be ready for another barrage of fuck yous. Sollux raised his hand, palm out and in his face. "No, shut up, just. Listen. No, actually, just look at this."

He turned to his computer and expertly navigated his way through computer stuff Karkat didn't give a flying fuck about when he was trying to get a goddamn explanation on being treated like a failure waiting to happen in the _one good thing _he'd -

"Thee this?"

"As it happens I do have working eyes, so yes."

"That was a really cheap shot."

"... Yeah okay it was. But honestly what the fuck? It's a file folder, congrats, your grubtop has files in it, now it's a little more useful than a giant paperweight."

"Alright I am going to speak slowly now, and once I'm done we will pretend I never did say anything." There was silence for a couple of seconds. "This is the porn database that everyone pretends doesn't exist."

Karkat's cheeks heated up a little; his anger floundered, caught in terrain he was most decidedly not ready for. Who had told Captor he could switch the field of battle on him and blindside him with such - such _random _counterattacks?

(Now that he thought of it he recognized a couple of titles.)

"This is the blackrom section. Over two hundred titles, over half of which were downloaded straight from your own husktop, thanks for your contribution."

Karkat could do nothing but splutter.

"Look at the number of hits," Sollux indicated, pretending like he didn't notice his utter mortification, that smug asshole. (The number of views was ridiculously high, of course. Almost a sweep in space with no internet access, no file sharing but what was on the meteor's intranet. No surprise.)

"Okay, now, this is conciliatory."

There were maybe a hundred and twenty files in that database, two-thirds of which pale. Good ashen porn was a lot rarer - demanded more effort on an actual plot - and so, Karkat suspected whenever he thought about what made for good porn movies which was _never_, less often kept.

It seemed like a lot at first glance, but ... Karkat hadn't needed much pale porn for the last sweep and yet even weeding out the ones that didn't ping him (mostly the ones with horn-polishing, it gave him twinges of horn envy that distracted from the movie) he still recognized pretty much all the titles.

"Where are you going with this?" he demanded, though it came out all strangled. Snarking about supposed (and therefore outrageously wrong even when accidentally right) porn-watching habits was one thing, perfectly acceptable between friends, but a clinical study of the group's actual patterns, backed up with hard data...

And now Sollux was turning away, cheeks and the tip of his ears gone grayish-gold, a claw scratching the underside of his chin in a really bad attempt at looking casual and not embarrassed. "I don't think there's anyone who doesn't pretty much know them all by heart by now. Is all. Tho. I'm thorry if it makes you uncomfortable, but." His voice went quieter, awkward and cautious and _soft_. "None of us are waiting for you to crash and burn, KK, we - actually, we... we think you do a pretty good job. And it's... hard. Not to pay attention. It's."

Karkat slowly felt behind him for his abandoned chair and sank back into it. "I," he choked out. "I'm not sure I - I get -"

Only he was certain he was getting it just fine, but surely he was wrong, he was always wrong, it was one of the pillars the universe was built on.

"It's not _voyeurism_, okay, it's not like anyone sneaks around spying on what the two of you do behind closed doors, but having those hints right there, it's a bit of a tease I guess. Oh gog I'm making it sound like you guys are flaunting it and being all slutty in public, that's not it at all! Hell, maybe if you were a little less cagey and all shy it'd be less intriguing _aaaaaand _I'm going to just shut up now."

Karkat sat in silence as he tried to reboot his brain. Sollux pretended to fiddle with random shit on his computer. His face was pretty much mustardy by now.

In the end the weirdest wasn't that people were living vicariously through a successful romance. He had nothing but platonic feelings for Kanaya and yet there was something strangely fascinating to the way she handled whatever dipshits tumbled feuding into her path. Made him think he wouldn't mind - well, not with her - but someone _like _her, maybe. Might be nice. Was nice to daydream about anyway.

The weirdest was that he, Karkat Vantas, was part of that relationship that fascinated people so much. (He'd have expected Nepeta and Equius, they were really kind of shameless, but while pretty cuddly whenever she happened to be in public Nepeta tended to prowl the back corridors of the asteroid a lot more than she hung out with the rest of the group. Also Equius was gross.) The weirdest was that he wasn't the only one to feel, to believe, that this was serendipity, gorgeous and special and perfect.

Karkat wondered if Sollux missed what he'd had with Aradia, whenever he looked at Gamzee and him, what kind of tangle of yearning and pain...

It _was _voyeurism, actually. He got up and pushed his chair back. "This is the point where we rewind and erase everything that just happened. Leader's order."

Sollux sighed, shoulders slumping, and he couldn't tell if that was relief or resignation. "Yeah, yeah. Go away."

Karkat paused, opened his mouth and found no words, and in the end what came out wasn't what he'd wanted to say at all; but then again he didn't know what would have been. "It never happened, okay?"

"I don't remember what you're talking about," Sollux managed to quip back, but he wouldn't turn to face Karkat.

Karkat absconded the fuck out of there, before he was tempted to ask Sollux if he wanted to maybe have a very short feelings jam, no strings attached.

If he started getting pale on him, he might as well get pale on the rest of the fuckers that comprised his team. Hey, assholes, cuddle orgy, bring your hairbrushes and your nail files, pay no attention to that murder-happy clowny fuckass I'm cheating on...

(Only they were feeling lonely.)

(And fuck did he pity them, even the ones he hated. But not half as much as he pitied Gamzee.)

* * *

It was true that compared to Nepeta and Equius, Karkat and Gamzee were a model of self-restrain and modesty. Objectively the only thing they did that Karkat didn't do with anyone else was that they stood a bit close to each other sometimes, and from time to time there'd be a well-timed nudge to bring one back down from funtime delusions turning worryingly somber, or random derailing of some awesome rant via flopping into the next chair over so they'd be shoulder to shoulder. Heck, if their first make-out hadn't been such a huge public drama, Karkat was starting to wonder if anyone would even have noticed. Which was fine, being discreet was a great quality...

Only it was starting to dawn on him that this was all Gamzee humoring him, because left to his own device his clowny failure of a palemate would probably spend half his days slumped across the back of Karkat's chair watching the screen go funny colors over Karkat's shoulder as he braided little tufts of hair into a crown around nubby horns. Only Karkat tended to shrug him off after five minutes with the excuse that he was so clingy Karkat felt smothered.

He wasn't 'being discreet' at this point; what he had was a hang-up, and Gamzee was being a great moirail by not pushing even though he wanted things different, just because he knew how uncomfortable it made Karkat feel, how he always felt like everyone was staring at them and then couldn't stand it and had to break away.

Well, actually. Everyone _was _staring at them.

Only, not to judge them. Which still blew his mind and which he still couldn't make himself believe. But he didn't need to believe jack shit about anyone else to know how not to be a selfish dickhead of a partner there.

"Hey, Gamzee. Come here."

He stayed on his chair, just turned it around and away from the screen. Gamzee rose from the junk pile, ambled his way, hands in pockets as if saying 'no worries brother, won't touch you, see?' It broke Karkat's heart a little.

He crooked his finger, voice low, but not too intimate (no need to make a spectacle of it) as he said, "Your facepaint's smudged, you look like an idiot. Get down here."

It was easy, no need to overthink it, it was easy, _just keep telling yourself that fucker, oh and also we're alone here, yeah, that's it, totally alone and also you're not blushing_...

But then Gamzee went down on a knee before him, long thin body graceful and absolutely no question, just trust, pure and immediate. Just a faint smile, almost floaty and vague, only he was meeting Karkat's eyes straight on, and it said 'I know what you're doing' and 'anything you need, it's yours'. And then it _was _easy, and then they _were _alone, and it was like Terezi was cooing and Equius looking all nostalgic and approving in some other room that wasn't worth paying attention to. Karkat tugged a paper towel out of his pocket and nudged his moirail's jaw up a little with just his fingertips and started working, careful as he dabbed away at some parts, smoothed down a line with his thumb until it was straight and neat along the startlingly graceful line of his cheekbone once again. Stupid paint and stupid pattern but they were part of Gamzee, so he would just love them.

It didn't last two minutes. It felt like... hours, days, a moment in time - a milestone.

"Wicked, brother," Gamzee said through an easy grin when he was done, "now I feel all prettified and shit," and that was it, he unfolded his miles and miles of legs and they exchanged a look that said more things than Karkat had words for and they turned back to their separate businesses.

Karkat spent the next half hour clicking blindly through link after link on pages he didn't read. Success, right? Gamzee was happy with it. Nothing else mattered. The people in the room had gotten their voyeuristic jollies on, grabbed a bit of happiness by proxy, which he guessed was like the red pit-fruit on a cake, wholly unnecessary but... not so bad... Hah, he felt so generous now, a goddamn prince, that was him. He felt...

It was hard to explain. Even to himself. Embarrassed, yeah, his face still burned a hour afterwards, even after people stopped watching him pseudo-discreetly or sighing dreamily at their screens. But something more.

Powerful, too - no, powerful was the wrong word, but something in a similar vein. Something that tingled in his limbs, a bubble of exhilaration. Like he could do anything now.

Proud. Because he always told himself he was a kickass moirail, and more importantly Gamzee told him that (and if only one opinion counted, his counted before Karkat's own) but he couldn't help but doubt always.

But everyone had watched them, and they all wished it could have been his own square, short-fingered hands touching their faces, or theirs cupping Gamzee's with such absolute trust, thumb pads brushing closed eyelids, jaw cupped in hands that might choose to twist and break his neck instead, and that didn't, wouldn't, ever.

It made him feel stronger and humbled both, it made him feel a rush of such overwhelming pity for all of them. Because he had Gamzee and they didn't, he had his pale half, he was complete.

They were not. He didn't know what to do about that.

He knew who to talk it out with, though.

* * *

"Goddamn - no, no, no, don't fail on me you miserable excuse for a husktop, I spent hours on that file, you can't do that to me!"

Click. Click click click. Apparently it could. "Aa_aaargh!_"

Gamzee ambled by, paused by his chair. "Aw, bro, what're you getting your angry on at?"

Karkat pointed at the empty blue screen. "Guess! Go on, just guess, I bet even your shattered think pan could figure it out!"

He kept ranting for a little while. Hours of work, down the drain, and he couldn't even bitch Sollux out because he'd warned him that some of the memory grubs were getting ready to molt and there was nothing he could do to fix it save breed more, and that'd take another five weeks. Karkat couldn't wait five weeks! Except now apparently there was no goddamn choice anymore and what was he going to do for five weeks, _all the software he needed was on this machine and_, and Gamzee's hand was on his backrest.

Huh.

He closed his eyes, took a shuddering breath, and tilted his head forward a mere half-inch. Even that much had him flushing, scrunching his eyes closed. Off to the side he could hear Feferi going "_oh_" very quietly.

Gamzee's long big-jointed fingers cupped the back of his neck, his exposed nape; his thumb ruffled the short bristly hair there, and then pressed into the muscles at the base of his skull. Karkat shuddered again, and let his air out.

All around the room was quiet, breaths held back, watching magic happening right before them. Behind him, his moirail was kneading the tension out of hard, knotted muscles, massaging the burgeoning headache out with miracle fingers.

And it was a gift to him and to them; it was worth Karkat's embarrassment, it was worth his need for the peace and balance only moirallegiance ever brought made bare for all to see. (It was past time he stopped pretending Gamzee needed him so much more than Karkat needed him, anyway.) He might have felt guilty using his moirail to get others' pale jollies off, but the way Gamzee grinned in the reflection of his screen, Karkat knew he didn't mind at all, he knew he'd never minded, and maybe this ridiculous overblown self-consciousness was one of the many sources of pointless stress Gamzee wanted to free him from anyway.

Maybe he was right, though Karkat still drew the line at making him purr in public, damn it.

Fucking Eridan and his fucking video camera glasses. Amateur Palemates Smuttin It Up!, video number one hundred twenty-one. Karkat told himself he was not going to track the number of views. Nope. Not even a little.

No matter how warm that made him feel deep in his chest, behind the mortification.


	2. Kinky Transquadrant Affair!

_Woo conciliatory shenanigans._

_First attempt at a Gamzee POV. Hmm._

* * *

Sleeping sitting up in his chair wasn't that great, though the way his face mashed against the keyboard was pretty nice, reminded him of an old pebbles-and-shells pile he used to have on his beach that Goatdad made him take down after he almost accidentally spent the day out on there. He probably could have kept dozing a little while longer before he had to move, even right through the furious whispering going on one husktop over, only then he heard his palebro's name.

"-shouldn't be in the database, you atthole, KK knows about it now, he'll find it, if he hasn't already!"

"Hey, they're the ones doin it in public, and also you're one ta talk, you filthy hypocrite, like you don't have a copy saved away on yer private mainframe!"

Gamzee cracked an eye open. His hair was all over his face, making it hard to see; he squinted a bit. Oh, _that _database. ... oh, _that_ vid. He considered telling Sollux to chill, that he'd saved a copy on his husktop too. Even though he could see his palebro's adorable faces from any angle he wanted pretty much everyday. Was just for the memories. One day when they were old (when Karkat was old and Gamzee wasn't) he could whip it out and go, look at that, motherfucking adorable first-time public cuddles. You were so cute back then. Then again Gamzee was sure Karkat would stay cute until the day he oh hey look at that a blinking cursor. Magic. How'd those little fuckers know to keep the tempo? Where'd they go when they weren't on the screen? Teleportation? Maybe it was magnets.

"-broke through the _thecurity _on _my personal mainframe_?"

Oh hey Solbro was getting all bristly and hissy and fire-eyed. Eribro grinned back proud and toothy. Spades were in the air. Gamzee grinned behind his hair and considered closing his eye, letting them have some privacy. Even though apparently the lab was turning into some kind of flirting central. Awesome. Maybe it was matchmaking. Good lab, best buddy.

"Nah, you were goin ta the loadgaper an' I sneaked a look."

Sollux's fiery look turned all flat and then he went 'ch and "Neverfuckingmind" which was a pretty neat word, and he turned away, all spades fled off. Ouch.

"H-hey! Don't turn yer back on me!"

But yeah, Solbro's back was turned pretty firm there. All wall-like and bored-now, and being bored of something was always kind of harsh. Gamzee lifted his head from the keyboard, vaguely wondering if he should leave before Eridan tried to force it with pouncing, 'cause _that _never worked, apart from making dents in the walls when Sol threw him around and left without even a little toothy kiss.

The dents usually were pretty funny-shaped, though. One of them had somehow come out looking like a hopbeast. Gamzee was kinda sad he'd never seen how Eridan had landed there to make it, but at the same time the mystery was made that pattern so special, and oh man sea dwellers' voices could climb pretty high with the sharp notes, couldn't they.

That was when someone grabbed the back of Gamzee's chair and yanked it around. He almost fell right off.

The next second he had his tiny miracle brother climbing all over his lap, making sure he didn't fall anywhere on account of being kind of pinned down. He had the best palebro ever.

"Hi there." He grinned in Karkat's hair, wrapping his arms around him. Karkat only growled quietly and burrowed in deeper, didn't even nip his chin to tell him back the hell off, and oh man, miracles everywhere! That meant _snuggles_. He up and went right on to that.

Off to the side Sollux was crackling a bit red-blue, made funny lights on Karkat's ear, which was all Gamzee could see of him on account of the rest of his face being all hidden in his neck. It was all nice and warm with the brightest blush on any troll in the universe. Funny how he wasn't all shaking with rage or anything, though. Almost like he'd just really, really wanted a cuddle and just went ahead and grabbed the shit out of it.

Which wasn't really like his palebro, but any reason Karkat found to cuddle Gamzee was pretty chill with.

"T-that, uh. ... Seariously, Sol, you - you're such a-"

"_Pet me_," Karkat hissed in Gamzee's neck.

Gamzee petted.

Eridan's voice went _gack_ and then quiet. Actually the whole lab was quiet. Magic. Gamzee didn't worry about it, just ran his hand through a mess of wiry hair, down the curve of a spine and then back up, scritched with his nails here and there a bit.

Karkat really wasn't overloading enough to need it so much. It kept on being the nicest motherfucking thing anyway, somehow.

Karkat nuzzled up behind his ear a bit. Gamzee tilted his head with a little chirp of encouragement.

"I am _so sorry_," Karkat whispered all quiet-like and ashamed in his ear.

"Hm?"

"I am _stealth-auspisticizing _between two assholes by _making out _with my _moirail_ as a _distraction_. Holy fucking shit, this is the _kinkiest thing I have ever done _and I didn't even ask for your consent first before _using_-"

Gamzee started laughing in his hair and squeezed all the breath out of him before more self-hating could come out. "You're the sneakiest little motherfucker. Pale for you, bro."

The blush on Karkat's cheeks went even hotter against him. "... pale for you," he mumbled back, hands fisted on the back of Gamzee's shirt.

"Oh my gooooooood _get a pile, guys!_"

Karkat tried to bristle-squirm his way off Gamzee's lap, and for a bit it was kind of like cuddling a quillbeast. So many pointy bits on his palebro, it was a mystery where they hid rest of the time. "Shoosh, bro," he said, and delivered a pap right between nubby little horns. "Vris-sis ain't got a half-bad idea. Let's go and get our pile on, yeah? We can jam for a bit." The way Karkat couldn't meet his eyes, he figured his palebro might need a little more 'no, really, I didn't mind, anything that makes you feel less horribly self-conscious in public is straight up bitchtits miracles to me' action before he actually believed it.

Also Solbro and Eribro had drifted apart all dazed, and from the way Eridan fiddled with his glasses there'd be another video to download tonight once they were done. He grinned with all his teeth to his best fishbro and navigated his little miracle brother through the room with a hand pressed to the middle of his back. Even more of a miracle, Karkat went along with it.

"... I'm never going to be allowed to be angry around you ever again, am I?"

"Bad for your bloodpusher, bro," Gamzee replied, and gave in to the temptation to pick him up and sling him on his shoulders for a quicker getaway.


End file.
